One of the world’s favourite detectives returns . . . for the final time?
Former Detective Hillary Greene has solved some of the toughest cases in Thames Valley Police’s cold case history. But this could be the one that breaks her.
Ten years ago, sixteen-year-old Angela Manning stepped off her school bus, and vanished. By morning, her broken body was found at the bottom of a disused Oxfordshire quarry. The inquest returned an open verdict. No murder weapon. No forensic evidence. Only one elderly witness, who glimpsed two shadowy figures standing on the cliff moments before Angela fell.
Now Hillary and her team must uncover what really happened that night. Angela was pretty, popular – and determined to become an actress. She dazzled the local amateur dramatics group she belonged to – but not everyone admired her confidence. Some loved her. Some envied her. And some had very good reasons to want her gone. Hillary and her team must retrace the schoolgirl’s final hours.
Because someone knows the truth about what happened on that lonely cliff edge. And they’ll do anything to keep Hillary from discovering it.
This is the case that Hillary’s boss, Superintendent Rollo Sale, has never been able to forget. Now he’s about to retire, he asks the cold case team to pull out all the stops. This could be Hillary Greene’s final investigation.
Faith Martin was born in Oxford, and has spent all her life within twenty miles of the university city, even working at Somerville College for six years before turning to writing full-time.
Faith has been writing for nearly 30 years under four different pen names and has had nearly 50 books published so far. She began writing romantic thrillers as Maxine Barry, which Joffe Books are in the process of re-releasing as brand new eBooks. Then she turned to crime, and as Joyce Cato wrote classic-style whodunits, since she’s always admired the golden-age crime novelists.
But it was when she created her fictional DI Hillary Greene, and began writing under the name of Faith Martin, that she finally began to become more widely known. Her latest literary characters WPC Trudy Loveday, and city coroner, Dr Clement Ryder, take readers back to the 1960’s and the city of Oxford.
Having lived within a few miles of the city of dreaming spires for all her life, both the city and the countryside/wildlife often feature in her novels. Although she has never lived on a narrow boat (unlike DI Hillary Greene!) the Oxford canal, the river Cherwell, and the flora and fauna of a farming landscape have always played a big part in her life – and often sneak their way onto the pages of her books.
Her hobbies include walking her now ageing dog, wildlife-watching, reading and (reluctantly) gardening.
My thoughts: Former DI Hillary Greene has been handed a case by her boss, it’s one he could never solve, the mysterious death of a sixteen-year-old girl ten years ago.
She wanted to be an actor and was the leading light of a local am dram society, but not particularly well liked. There’s actually quite a lot of suspects.
As Hillary and her colleagues re-interview the people who knew Angela best, and try to piece together her last day, and why she was at the quarry to begin with.
At the same time, it becomes clear that the cold case unit is going to be closed, Hillary has to figure out what she wants to do next, and it’s actually good timing for Claire, who is dealing with family problems, so this might be their last case. If they can solve it.
I’ve read several of the books in this series, they work pretty well as standalones as well as a series, the cases are always clever and the characters interesting, as it is here. The am dram group are all very unpleasant in different ways, and Angela was probably quite annoying. But not enough for someone to kill her, surely?
*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour, but all opinions remain my own.
